APDOC workshops in Côte d’Ivoire a huge success

04/11/2022

During the session on agriculture and pollution, the APDOC activities addressed a range of topics including: soil leaching, the greenhouse effect, eutrophication, respiratory diseases, and the level of pollutants in soil and water.

An important goal of the INSA project is to communicate the importance of nitrogen management to the decision makers of tomorrow and the broader community. To help meet this objective, the INSA project is collaborating with the association Les Petit.e.s Débrouillard.e.s d’Occitanie (APDOC), a French non-for-profit organization dedicated to science popularisation.

In January 2022, Alexandre Eissautier and Clarisse Samson, two scientific facilitators from APDOC, embarked on a two-month mission in Côte d’Ivoire to run a series of interactive workshops with secondary school children. Alexandre and Clarisse spent one month at each of two different schools, one in Bingerville, Abidjan, and the other in Soubré, a town situated in the south-west of Côte d’Ivoire. 145 students and 7 teachers participated in the workshops, which used hands on activities to educate the children about the “Nitrogen Paradox”. Alexandre and Clarisse employed a range of tailor-made activities including experiments, role playing, and board games to explore the nitrogen cycle, the impacts of nitrogen on the environment and the history of nitrogen fertiliser.

At the end of each cycle of workshops, an official ceremony was held to promote the students’ training. During the ceremonies, the students themselves animated a selection of activities to other students, teachers and officials.

In-between the workshops, Alexandre and Clarisse participated in the first INSA workshop that took place in Abidjan during their secondment. During the workshop they facilitated a range of activities, including: a world café with workshop participants, an afternoon of hands-on activities to improve communication and dissemination skills of scientists towards a non-scientific public, and a science café with first- and second-year students at Felix Houphouët Boigny University (FHBU). They also interviewed eight women in science to provide role models for and encourage girls in primary and secondary school to embrace scientific studies. These interviews can be accessed on the INSA website, in the PODCAST tab.

The school interventions and various communication activities performed by the APDOC seconded staff members were unequivocally a huge success, with feedback from all people involved being extremely positive! The scientists attending the workshop were particularly inspired by the school interventions and are keen to see similar programs implemented in their home countries.

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